TOXIC toads are threatening an environmental doomsday on one of the last great Noah¹s Arks left on the planet.

The poisonous amphibians are set to wreak havoc on Madagascar by wiping out the vital predators that keep nature in check on this paradise island.

And conservationists are calling for urgent “control measures” to tackle the invasive toads whose skin is deadly to the snakes and mammals that would otherwise prevent its spread.

Ominously, by poisoning Madagascar’s carnivorous creatures it also means delicate food chains could be shattered, allowing rats and other verminous rodents to run amok.

Isolated in the Indian Ocean for 90 million years, Madagascar's flora and fauna have evolved so that almost 90 per cent of its natural treasures such as lemurs and fossa are found nowhere else on Earth.

There are native frogs but no toads.

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Somehow “stow-away” Asian toads ­scientific name Duttaphrynus melanostictus have gained a foothold around the eastern port of Toamasina and now threaten to wreak environmental havoc on the island¹s already beleaguered wildlife.

Forest loss, agricultural fires, erosion and over-collection of species from the wild have already had devastating impacts on Madagascar’s unique ecosystems.

A new scientific paper published in Current Biology highlights the risks posed by the invasive toad, explaining how it has been kept under control in native Asiatic haunts because predators evolved gene mutations to withstand the toxins found in its skin.

An international team of biologists from Bangor University, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, the University of Braunschweig and the Natural History Museums of Munich, Stuttgart and Turin, have confirmed that native Malagsay animals lack the mutations needed to withstand the toxins so predators that ingest toads are likely to be poisoned.

Herpetologist Dr Wolfgang Wüster, from Bangor University’s School of Biological Sciences, warned: “There has been vigorous debate on the likely impact of the invasive toads and the lengths we should go to in our efforts to control or eradicate them.

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“The fear is that the toads will send shockwaves through the entire ecosystem: the presence and spread of the Asian toads could threaten many endemic predators as they are poisoned by eating the toads, and in turn their prey, such as rodents, could increase in numbers.

“Control of the spread of Asian toads should now become a significant conservation priority and should receive appropriate resources.

“Our findings mean that conservation priorities and resources can now be allocated based on robust data rather than supposition.”

Bangor University Masters student Ben Marshall worked on toad project for his degree and says it is another example of a how a species from one part of the world can disrupt natural ecosystems.

“Preventing the introduction of alien invasive species must be a top priority for biodiversity conservation, and should be a key consideration for all international transport of goods that could deliberately or inadvertently result in alien species getting established outside of their range,” he added.